HOW HE WON OUT | AdventAI

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, Cal. · Sep 13, 1905

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 31, No. 37.

HOW HE WON OUT.

A True Story.

It was two years ago the 7th of June coming, my little girl Esther's birthday. I was getting ready to go to work, when she came into the room where I was.

"I am ten years old to-day, papa," she said.

"Yes, I know it, little girl, and I've got just fifteen cents in my pocket. What will I get you?"

"I don't want you to get me anything, papa."

"O," I answered.

"But I want you to promise me something, papa," she said.

"Well, go ahead; let's hear it."

"I want you to promise me you won't drink any more. That will be my birthday present," she said.

"O, run along, little girl," I answered; "your mother has been talking to you."

I heard her go outside, and I slipped into the kitchen where my wife was and asked her why she had been talking to Esther about my drinking. She said she had not, and burst out crying. Then I got a little rattled. I never suspected that my children knew I drank. It is true that I reeled home many a night and that I scarcely ever drew a sober breath; but they were in bed, and by morning I was always over the worst effects of the liquor. I do not know how she learned it; possibly by instinct. But it was a shock to me and unnerved me. I went back into the sitting-room and began to choke up. I tried to clear my throat by swallowing, but couldn't do it. My eyes were filling with tears, altho I couldn't cry. I threw myself full length on the lounge and blubbered out a sort of prayer, "Lord, if You'll help me, I'll never touch liquor again." In a little while Esther came running in, saw me, and said:

"Papa, you've made up your mind to promise, haven't you? I know it."

"Yes, I have, little girl. I am going to try never to drink again, and more than that, I am going to put a penny in your bank for every time I refuse a glass."

Do you know that in seven weeks I had two hundred and seventy-seven pennies in that bank? But election time came on, and one morning I found that some one during the night had rolled a keg of beer to my door. "That settles the penny proposition, Esther," I said when I saw it. "I guess there are more glasses in that keg than I have pennies. Children, roll it over there on the commons."

They did so, and it remained there a couple of days, but was gone the third morning. My old boon friends had given up trying to get me to break my promise. When I saw that man there in a saloon, last April, one of the men at the bar, to test me, put a $10 gold piece in the bottom of a glass and told the bartender to fill the glass with beer.

"Do you mean it?" he said.

"Of course I do. Go ahead."

He did, and then my friend turned to me, and said: "O! drink the beer and keep the gold."

"Not if you filled my pockets with gold," I answered.

Not long ago my five children were attacked with diphtheria. I lost a sweet little six-year-old girl. Before she died she threw her arms around my neck as I sat at the bed and said, "Papa, you kept your promise, didn't you?"

Will any sane man tell me I'll ever drink again? —The Indianapolis News.